Maldives Macroeconomic Forecasting:

This study aims to build an efficient small-scale macroeconomic forecasting tool for Maldives. Due to significant limitations in data availability, empirical economic modeling for the country can be problematic. To address data constraints and circumvent the “curse of dimensionality,” Bayesian vector autoregression estimations are utilized comprising of component-disaggregated domestic sectoral production, price, and tourism variables. Results demonstrate how this methodology is appropriate for economic modeling in Maldives. With the appropriate level of shrinkage, Bayesian vector autoregressions can exploit the information content of the macroeconomic and tourism variables. Augmenting for qualitative assessments, the directional inclination of the forecasts is improved.